Liz's Birthday

To celebrate my birthday, Brent and I went to the Anchorage Zoo. I loved seeing all the animals, especially the alpaca (see the previous post). Then we went to Namaste Shangri-la (a Himalayan restaurant in Anchorage). The food was good, especially the garlic naan :).

Just before we left the waiter brought out apricot halwa (a grated apricot and carrot pudding that was served warm) with a candle on top. It was the first of three celebration desserts for my birthday (eaten on different days).

This year I wanted a specific type of birthday cake. I called a few bakeries and none of them made the kind of cake I wanted. My motto in life tends to be, "If you can't find what you want, create it!"

So that's what I did! I made my own birthday cake this year which was a hybrid of my two favorite types of cake, German chocolate and coconut (basically a yellow cake mix with coconut extract & coconut) with coconut pecan frosting. I would have liked to make it from scratch but I was pressed for time, so the box mix worked just fine. This hybrid combination proved to be delicious, I really think bakeries would do well to offer this combination! If Meg were here, I know she would've appreciated it! :)

When I came upstairs I was surprised by Brent singing happy birthday and seeing balloon chandeliers. Brent had blown up squiggly balloons and they were hanging from the lights in our living room, it was bright and colorful.

I had left over batter from using two boxes of cake mix so I decided to make birthday cupcakes to take to our church community group. I baked two different types of cupcakes: German chocolate cake with coconut icing (whipped buttercream icing with coconut extract) and coconut cake (yellow cake with coconut extract and coconut) with dark chocolate icing. Both were topped with shredded coconut. As is probably evident by now, I like coconut. The cupcakes turned out pretty good, though I think the cake was even better. Overall, it was fun to experiment with different flavors and try something new.